(word processor parameters LM=8, RM=75, TM=2, BM=2)
Taken from KeelyNet BBS (214) 324-3501
Sponsored by Vangard Sciences
PO BOX 1031
Mesquite, TX 75150
There are ABSOLUTELY NO RESTRICTIONS
on duplicating, publishing or distributing the
files on KeelyNet!
April 17, 1991
REICH2.ASC
--------------------------------------------------------------------
The following item appeared in the _NEW TIMES_ tabloid in Miami,
Florida. It was taken from a column called "The Straight Dope".
The NEW TIMES ("Miami's News and Arts Weekly") is an artsy, liberal,
alternative newspaper. Some of its columns are rather off-beat,
including "The Straight Dope", where readers write in and ask
various formidable or abstract questions (such as "What is the
nature of Light?", or, "Why do we have two eyes and not three?").
The answers given to these question, while techinically correct, are
usually written in a cynical or derisive tone.
Having said that, here is the item:
From the _New Times_
Vol. 5, N0. 46
Miami, Florida
March 6-12, 1991
pg 8.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Question:
I've always cast a jaundice eye on the shenanigans of scientific
fringe groups. But my eye is a little less yellow when I look
at Wilhelm Reich.
Reich claimed to have discovered a life energy he called
"orgone" back in the Thirties. He made a device that supposedly
accumulated the energy, the "orgone accumulator" (ORAC), and
another that allegedly could manipulate it in the atmosphere
called a "cloudbuster".
Some MDs who still subscribe to Reich's theories publish the
_Journal of Orgonomy_. I remember one article claiming tomato
plants grown inside an ORAC produce more and larger tomatoes.
There's a meteorologist names James DeMeo who does research on
the cloudbuster.
Plus (and this is the ultimate evidence) Kate Bush sang a song
about the cloudbuster on her Hounds of Love album. Seeing as
you're the last word on subjects like this, what's the last word
on orgone? Yes, no, or maybe? - S.S.
Page 1
The reply:
How about "sheesh"? I fail to see what a self-described skeptic
could find appealing about the work of Wilhelm Reich, one of the
classic scientific screw-balls.
Reich claimed that 1) he had done battle with alien spaceships,
2) he could produce clouds and create rain with his cloudbuster,
and 3) his orgone boxes could cure (or at least ameliorate)
everything from cancer to the common cold.
He believed living cells arose spontaneously from inorganic
matter; that cancer cells are actually protozoalike critters
that have tails and can swim like fish; and that orgone energy
is what makes the sky blue and causes heat shimmer.
Even his terminology was nutsy. UFOs he called EAs, for Energy
Alpha. The alien spaceships gave off DOR, for Deadly ORgone.
The aliens themselves he called CORE men, for Cosmic ORgone
Engineering.
Reich was an intelligent, charismatic man who seems to have had
only the most tenous grasp of reality. He was a cherished
associate of Freud in his early years and made some useful
contributions to psychoanalytic theory. But his ideas became
more and more eccentric over time and he was eventually expelled
from the International Psychoanalytic Association.
He wound up in the U.S. and from then on it was orgone morning,
noon, and night. Reich convinced a great many people, including
a few scientists like the aforementioned DeMeo, who claims he
ended a drought with a cloudbuster.
To this day there are several orgonomic societies. But the
mainstream view has always been that Reich is a quack and that
his ideas have no scientific basis. One of his orgone boxes, in
fact, is on display in St. Louis's National Museum of Quackery.
In 1956 Reich was convicted of shipping orgone boxes across
state lines in defiance of a court order obtained by the Food
and Drug Administration. He was sent to prison, where he died of
a heart attack in 1957.
But his ideas, such as they are, live on. A summary of Reich's
career by science writer Martin Gardner may be found in the fall
1988 "Skeptical Enquirer"; for a full-length treatment check out
_Fury on Earth_ by Martin Sharaf. - Cecil Adams
--------------------------------------------------------------------
If you have comments or other information relating to such topics
as this paper covers, please upload to KeelyNet or send to the
Vangard Sciences address as listed on the first page.
Thank you for your consideration, interest and support.
Jerry W. Decker.........Ron Barker...........Chuck Henderson
Vangard Sciences/KeelyNet
--------------------------------------------------------------------
If we can be of service, you may contact
Jerry at (214) 324-8741 or Ron at (214) 242-9346
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Page 2